Kael moved silently through the mist that blanketed the monastery's hillside.
The building ahead was ancient — older than the Visigoths themselves.
Its walls whispered in a tongue lost long before the Romans.
The disc pulsed twice.
The anomaly was inside.
---
Crossing the threshold, Kael immediately noticed something wrong:
time was folding.
Candle flames moved in reverse.
Footsteps echoed before they were made.
Dust floated, then fell, then floated again.
And in the main hall…
he found himself.
---
Not a mirror.
Not a recording.
But another him.
Dressed as a monk, head lowered, seated in silence.
The Second Shadow lifted his gaze.
— You're early — he said, without looking surprised.
— Or perhaps… I'm late.
Kael approached slowly.
— You knew I was coming?
The Shadow nodded.
— I asked for you…
though I forgot why.
---
Kael studied the man — his posture, his expression.
There was no malice. No deception.
Only fatigue.
— What happened here?
The Shadow smiled faintly.
— I tried to fix time by disappearing from it.
To break the cycle by… stepping out of it.
He gestured to the room.
— But time found me anyway.
---
At that moment, the disc pulsed again.
A burst of static echoed through the hall.
And then, from behind one of the broken arches,
a second presence emerged —
not a Shadow… but something born from the fold itself.
A fracture of identity.
Kael stood ready.
And so did his other self.
Together, they would face the consequence…
of trying to abandon time.